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[SPOILERS] Jaehaerys and Alysanne


Lord Varys

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@Lord Varys, I'm not too sure about Daella. She's definitely immature emotionally for a Princess of the era, but she doesn't seem to have real mental problems from what I could tell. Plus she's never called that in the World book, but this is a much expanded/detailed version of the reign of Jaehaerys I, so that could be due to being an older source. However, I get the feeling that simple-minded is thrown around a lot by the Maesters to describe mental issues that they simply don't understand. Its like you said about Jaehaera; she's less simple-minded and more deeply traumatized by what she went through during the Dance of the Dragons. Though I suppose Daella could be the model by which the Maesters judge later simple-minded Targaryens.

Also, to Vaegon. I confess I know very little about the Autism spectrum, but is the way he looked at people and treated them, like bugs (paraphrasing here), a normal trait for people on the spectrum or is that a sign of something else? Second, the asexual thing, couldn't he be both asexual and Autistic, rather than one or the other?

Third, I also found is very interesting to see how few of Jaehaerys and Alysanne's children were dragon riders. Nine survived childhood, yet only three tamed dragons; so we have six Targaryens that never tried to tame dragons (well five as Saera was stopped before she could get into the Dragonpit).

Finally, totally unrelated to the above, but do we know if the Hightowers ever got their High Septon? I feel like that part of the narrative suddenly dropped off and was never picked back up.

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1 hour ago, Hiigara129 said:

@Lord VarysThird, I also found is very interesting to see how few of Jaehaerys and Alysanne's children were dragon riders. Nine survived childhood, yet only three tamed dragons; so we have six Targaryens that never tried to tame dragons (well five as Saera was stopped before she could get into the Dragonpit).

I don't think Jaehaerys was entirely comfortable with the idea of many dragonriders around. He would have been entirely cognizant of the situation in his youth and the potential for dragon on dragon warfare. I don't think he was ever particularly comfortable with Rhaena and Dreamfyre and the incident with Aerea would not have helped. If you look at it all together, it was only Aemon, Baelon and Alyssa who got dragons from his children. Most of his sons died in the cradle and Vaegon was sent to the citadel. The girls were going to marry outside the family. So only those who were involved in the governance of the Realm got dragons. I don't think it was accidental. Later in life the situation slipped from his control, or he could find no good reason to deny, say Rhaenys from claiming a dragon. 

 

1 hour ago, Hiigara129 said:

@Lord Varys

Finally, totally unrelated to the above, but do we know if the Hightowers ever got their High Septon? I feel like that part of the narrative suddenly dropped off and was never picked back up.

I assumed they did, in any case raising Alfyn as High Septon was the end of their troubles with the Faith, so that story line was pretty much dumped. 

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Saera's treatment also seemed excessive. Her behavior to me looks like that of a teenager who was acting out. He pranks while some of them mean were relatively benign. Even the one who got the fool injured was not meant to actually hurt him. If it worked as planned they would have just find him sitting on the Iron Throne. I think that prank was aimed at her father. By contrast Viserra's antics would have gotten someone killed. 

Other than that it was mostly drinking and having ill considered sex. Hardly unprecedented behavior for an adolescent. Considering he forgave Rogar Baratheon the punishment seems disproportionate. Despite what Barth said, sending her to the Silent Sisters would have seemed to Saera like he disowned and banished her. 

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9 hours ago, The Dragon Demands said:

i wish we had a few more links between Deria and Morion Martell

Does Mara fit as Qoren's mother in the timeline? Deria, Old Prince, Morion, Mara, Qoren, Aliandra?  Deria was princess in 37, by 61 there is a Prince.  Perhaps the Old Prince had a long reign and like Jae who took on the moniker of the Old King in his later years so did the Prince start to be called that. 

In 83 Morion comes to the throne.  He's described as young though, so I wonder could Mara be his sister and not daughter? There doesn't seem to be an indication that she had a regent in that small passage where she is mentioned as becoming Princess so she was probably of age.  Maybe Morion was just seen as young relative to the Old of his father but was well old enough to have grown up kids? 110(?) we have Qoren involved in the Stepstones stuff. 

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3 minutes ago, Ran said:

Heh. I actually did suggest calling him Namor instead, but George didn't go for it.

Moronion would have been better ;-).

7 hours ago, Hiigara129 said:

@Lord Varys, I'm not too sure about Daella. She's definitely immature emotionally for a Princess of the era, but she doesn't seem to have real mental problems from what I could tell.

She has a very bad memory, though, and couldn't learn to read. She is certainly not necessarily mentally challenged to the highest degree, but she has severe issues in that department. Some of it might also been caused by her constant fear (of failure), but she certainly had issues.

I just asked whether she might be the template because it doesn't really convince me that Gael was much worse in that department considering she was actually a help and comfort to Alysanne in old age, and one assumes if she had had severe mental issues she would have been more of a burden than a help.

7 hours ago, Hiigara129 said:

Plus she's never called that in the World book, but this is a much expanded/detailed version of the reign of Jaehaerys I, so that could be due to being an older source.

I don't think @Ran knew much more about Daella than what was put in TWoIaF but he would have to comment on that himself.

7 hours ago, Hiigara129 said:

However, I get the feeling that simple-minded is thrown around a lot by the Maesters to describe mental issues that they simply don't understand. Its like you said about Jaehaera; she's less simple-minded and more deeply traumatized by what she went through during the Dance of the Dragons.

What does suggest Autism in Jaehaera is that she was slow to speak and also didn't do a lot of other things children are supposed to do at the right age. But it clearly changed, apparently, since she can talk later on when we meet her as queen. What caused her to be the way she is as she is later - the traumas or other things - is pretty much impossible to determine.

7 hours ago, Hiigara129 said:

Also, to Vaegon. I confess I know very little about the Autism spectrum, but is the way he looked at people and treated them, like bugs (paraphrasing here), a normal trait for people on the spectrum or is that a sign of something else? Second, the asexual thing, couldn't he be both asexual and Autistic, rather than one or the other?

That is a very complex issue. The bottom line is: People on the Autism spectrum don't socially interact the way normal people do. In part because they are less interested in that kind of thing, in part because it is far to taxing for them because their brains do not properly filter sensory input (noise, light, smells, etc.). For instance, it is very taxing for girlfriend to hang out in a bar and interact normally because she hears all the noises and conversations without being able to filter it so that her focus is only on the conversation at her table (similar things make it pretty hard to buy things in a supermarket). If you get too much of that you 'overload', meaning you get very exhausted and tired when the thing is over. If you can't get out of the situation and and recover you get a meltdown or shutdown - meaning you basically can no longer properly function (that's the image of Autistic children rolling in a ball in kindergarten and screaming like hell for no apparent reason from the point of view of normal people).

They also have great trouble understanding irony or reading other people emotions in their faces or body language or using their own faces and bodies to express such emotions. That may come in when it is hard for Elysar/Jaehaerys to say whether Vaegon smiled or not when his father told he were to become an archmaester.

But as @direpupy and I already said - Vaegon doesn't seem to have those negative traits. He has the classical special interests of Autistic people, in his case books and arcane topics in books, he tends to speak the truth never mind whether that's socially acceptable or appropriate at the time (which, as I said, I think is embodied by the outburst about Daella - and later also when Alyssa throws the wine or what it was at him).

Autism definitely doesn't come with asexuality, but the interest in romantic and sexual relationships often comes rather late - my girlfriend had her first relationship in her mid-twenties, and had a very hard time imagining herself in one before that. During actual adolescence she was still much more interested in the interests she developed as a child (and some of them are still very important).

If we see Vaegon as an Autistic person then his non-interest in his sisters or other women at the age of 12-15, say, (15 being the age he was sent to the Citadel to become an archmaester) doesn't necessarily mean he would never develop and interest in sex or romance. It may have come later, say in his twenties or so, but if it came we never learned about it.

What is perceived as him being cold is just him being awkward with social interactions and not feeling the need to hang out or interact with people all that much. Alysanne feels his letters are cold and distant, but for him they might be actually a sufficient expression of the love a son feels for his mother.

By the way - we can strike Vaegon from the list of the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren that showed up at the anniversary tourney in 98 AC. Not only did people scarcely remember him when Jaehaerys I called him to court in 101 AC, but it had been years since Alysanne had last seen his face around the time she died.

It also fits perfectly that Vaegon would reject taking the throne out of hand. Far too much social interaction, and chances are very high that Aerys I is actually Vaegon come all over again, and in his case his reclusive lifestyle may have nothing to do with Bloodraven isolating him or anything but with him not being able to suffer it to hang out with many people all the time.

7 hours ago, Hiigara129 said:

Third, I also found is very interesting to see how few of Jaehaerys and Alysanne's children were dragon riders. Nine survived childhood, yet only three tamed dragons; so we have six Targaryens that never tried to tame dragons (well five as Saera was stopped before she could get into the Dragonpit).

After Balerion/Aerea the Dragonkeepers were founded to prevent the theft of another great dragon. That Daella never became a dragonrider is clear - she was afraid of them. Vaegon was apparently not interested, so that's that. Saera and Viserra is odd, considering that Saera got along pretty well with daddy before the episode. And one should imagine she would have been interested in flying at the power and prestige that came with it at a much earlier age... The same goes for Viserra. There would have been no harm in her being a dragonrider for, say, 1-3 years before her death.

7 hours ago, Hiigara129 said:

Finally, totally unrelated to the above, but do we know if the Hightowers ever got their High Septon? I feel like that part of the narrative suddenly dropped off and was never picked back up.

They did get him. But I really don't like how the Hightowers were dealt with. So much detail on the earlier lords, and then Donnel's relation to Martyn is unclear and we don't know either Donnel's successor's name nor who was the father of Otto or the name of his lordly brother.

6 hours ago, The Sleeper said:

Saera's treatment also seemed excessive. Her behavior to me looks like that of a teenager who was acting out. He pranks while some of them mean were relatively benign. Even the one who got the fool injured was not meant to actually hurt him. If it worked as planned they would have just find him sitting on the Iron Throne. I think that prank was aimed at her father. By contrast Viserra's antics would have gotten someone killed. 

Saera was psychopath. They don't really understand the concept, but it becomes very clear during the tirade she gives in front of the Iron Throne. For Jaehaerys the comparison to emulate Maegor is the crowning glory.

But they did not really understand what she was. Alysanne still loves her, and Jaehaerys, too, never mind what he says. That becomes clear in old age. He condemns her for being whore - which is the misogyny in the culture he lives in - never fully understanding what was actually wrong with her. And that sex was just some she liked to do and something she as coin to get what she wanted. The latter is a very common behavior in female psychopaths.

6 hours ago, The Sleeper said:

Other than that it was mostly drinking and having ill considered sex. Hardly unprecedented behavior for an adolescent. Considering he forgave Rogar Baratheon the punishment seems disproportionate. Despite what Barth said, sending her to the Silent Sisters would have seemed to Saera like he disowned and banished her. 

That's the different standards. Have you also noticed that atypical men are never reputed to be evil sorcerers?

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1 hour ago, Lord Varys said:

It also fits perfectly that Vaegon would reject taking the throne out of hand. Far too much social interaction, and chances are very high that Aerys I is actually Vaegon come all over again, and in his case his reclusive lifestyle may have nothing to do with Bloodraven isolating him or anything but with him not being able to suffer it to hang out with many people all the time.

 

1 hour ago, Lord Varys said:

Autism definitely doesn't come with asexuality, but the interest in romantic and sexual relationships often comes rather late - my girlfriend had her first relationship in her mid-twenties, and had a very hard time imagining herself in one before that. During actual adolescence she was still much more interested in the interests she developed as a child (and some of them are still very important).

I think you explained Autism very well in your post.

I would like to lift out these two parts, i agree that Aerys I could very well also be autistic and your apt mentioning that relationships usually come latter in live for people with autism (i myself did not have my first real relationship till my early thirties) but that they do have relationship, could also reflect on his refusal to set aside his wife. Even if he was not interested in a sexual relationship with her that does not mean he in his own way did not love her. He could have been very content with the relationship they had.

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Vaegon strikes me as just "cold and aloof".  Autism would be indicated by stuff Jaehaera had - outright lack of social cues.

Vaegon learned enough social cues to get by, if perfunctory.

Moreover, disinterest in sex isn't really a symptom of autism (he even ignored books of erotica, so it wasn't social anxiety either).

A lot of people now are saying he just sounds like he was "Asexual and Aromantic" (….how did Aromantic become a thing?  Everybody needs somebody, no man is an island...)


At any rate, while he might plausibly have had "really high functioning Asperger's/Autism" to the point that it was indistinguishable...it was indistinguishable.  He must have had other stuff going on: Asexual.

He doesn't really have any of the markers of the autistic spectrum (narrow interests, patterns, extreme social blindness).  He KNEW social cues, he just didn't really care.  

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Regarding the Great Council of 101 AC (it fits here more than in the Dance thread):

There were 14 claimants great and small.  9 lesser claimants were soon dismissed.  The final five were Vaegon (discounted due to his maester's vows, and he didn't even press the claim), Rhaenys and her daughter Laena (dismissed for being female), and the two finalists, Viserys and Laenor.  

A full list of the 9 minor claimants wasn't given.  Some included:

  • 3 bastard sons of Saera Targaryen, each by different men.  One looked just like a young Jaehaerys, one was the bastard son of a Triarch of Old Volantis (it seems Saera finally got her elephant).  Saera herself didn't even press her claim - though Vaegon didn't press his claim either yet was included in this count, so let's say she counts as a fourth.
  • A man who provided parchments (is that meant to be real proof?) that he was a descendant of Gaemon the Glorious of Dragonstone, through a younger daughter who wed a minor lord, and on for seven generations.  Is this real? It seems real.
  • A red-haired man claiming he was a bastard son of Maegor, product of raping an innkeeper's daughter (they believed the rape happened, but did doubt Maegor ever fathered a child) due to his apparent sterility).
  • A man falsely claiming to be a bastard son of Jaehaerys himself.  Seized and imprisoned when the king proved him a liar.

Those are seven claimants.  Who were the other two?

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10 minutes ago, The Dragon Demands said:

Vaegon strikes me as just "cold and aloof".  Autism would be indicated by stuff Jaehaera had - outright lack of social cues.

Vaegon learned enough social cues to get by, if perfunctory.

Moreover, disinterest in sex isn't really a symptom of autism (he even ignored books of erotica, so it wasn't social anxiety either).

A lot of people now are saying he just sounds like he was "Asexual and Aromantic" (….how did Aromantic become a thing?  Everybody needs somebody, no man is an island...)


At any rate, while he might plausibly have had "really high functioning Asperger's/Autism" to the point that it was indistinguishable...it was indistinguishable.  He must have had other stuff going on: Asexual.

He doesn't really have any of the markers of the autistic spectrum (narrow interests, patterns, extreme social blindness).  He KNEW social cues, he just didn't really care.  

I have autism and am higher functioning and like Vaegon i had to learn social interaction and to distinguish social cues in which i succeeded to a certain degree but not completely. Also i came late into my interest in sex, as i posted my first real relationship was in my early thirties and my first interest in sex came only a few years before that. So im sorry but i can emphatically and with certainty say you are wrong he does not have to have anything else going one.

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We have no idea about the other claimants. Probably similar fairy-tale claims.

I've tossed around the idea that the guy claiming descent from Gaemon's younger daughter might have been Lord Harte, the father of Lady Hazel Harte, the mother of Daenaera Velaryon.

The fact that Daenaera has such striking Valyrian features could, perhaps, be better explained if she had drops of Targaryen blood on both sides of her lineage.

3 hours ago, direpupy said:

I would like to lift out these two parts, i agree that Aerys I could very well also be autistic and your apt mentioning that relationships usually come latter in live for people with autism (i myself did not have my first real relationship till my early thirties) but that they do have relationship, could also reflect on his refusal to set aside his wife. Even if he was not interested in a sexual relationship with her that does not mean he in his own way did not love her. He could have been very content with the relationship they had.

Not to mention that they may have been married for years at the time (if we assume Aerys was married out the same time as Baelor and Maekar), and he may have just become accustomed to this marriage, seeing no reason to end it. He would have likely not felt the social pressure to produce an heir the same way Queen Aelinor apparently did. And, sure, it is also not unlikely that he actually loved Aelinor in his way - I don't think he would have agreed to marry if he didn't like his cousin.

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You know, something else that bothered me was the choice of husband for Viserra. Daella got to pick between the Lords/heirs Stark, Arryn and Lannister. yet Viserra was stuck with a three/four-times widowed (can't remember which) Lord Manderly whose claim was being a close friend of Queen Alysanne. Seemed to be a waste of alliances in my book.

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On 11/23/2018 at 10:30 PM, Lord Varys said:

 

Rogar's mad dream about using his axe on Maegor is also channeling Lyonel in THK who wants to give Maekar a beating. It is quite clear that only the dragons keep Baratheon ambition in line back then.

Borys is really as poisonous as Renly. He wants Storm's End for himself, so he urges Lord Rogar to take the black.

And it is really great that at least two of Borros' daughters show similar behavior. Maris is very poisonous indeed, and Cassandra shows that a hunger for power isn't a male thing at all.

Seems like a set up for the Rebellion. The conquest started with what happened to Argilac and Argella, their descendant put an end to the Targaryens but they had been itching for their moment.

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1 minute ago, AryaNymeriaVisenya said:

Seems like a set up for the Rebellion. The conquest started with what happened to Argilac and Argella, their descendant put an end to the Targaryens but they had been itching for their moment.

And why not? The Baratheons basically are black-haired Targaryens who don't do the incest thing and never got any dragons. But they have the blood.

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Just now, Lord Varys said:

And why not? The Baratheons basically are black-haired Targaryens who don't do the incest thing and never got any dragons. But they have the blood.

Are they though? It takes two to tango and everything seems to have come from Argella besides the name. If anything the name just hides what they really are, the Storm Kings. Its a nice bookend for that era of the story. The family will likely get another cycle soon as Stannis and Shireen repeat the Argilac and Argella story. Defeated in battle, betrayed by her own people. Then another bastard to take control.

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14 hours ago, AryaNymeriaVisenya said:

Are they though?

If what they believe about Orys is true, they are Targaryens. All of them. They don't call themselves that, and theyare not Targaryens on both sides like Daemon Blackfyre (who essentially is a legitimized Orys) was, but they are an illegitimate male cadet branch of the house.

And they got more Targaryen blood (albeit pretty diluted) through Alyssa Velaryon and then, much later, through Princess Rhaelle.

It may very well be that they inherited their looks and some of their traits from the Durrandons, but that doesn't change from whom they are descended through the male line.

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So where is the supposed battle between Jaehaerys and a "host of wildlings, giants, and wargs"? This is the story Viserys I tells his grandkids before he dies (also mentioned in The Princess and the Queen), about how the Old King flew to the Wall to battle what I said above. While I've no doubt that most of it is a mummer's farce, surely the grain of truth isn't just the time when Alysanne flew there, couldn't get her dragon past the Wall, and dealt with some captured wildlings.

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1 hour ago, Corvinus said:

So where is the supposed battle between Jaehaerys and a "host of wildlings, giants, and wargs"? This is the story Viserys I tells his grandkids before he dies (also mentioned in The Princess and the Queen), about how the Old King flew to the Wall to battle what I said above. While I've no doubt that most of it is a mummer's farce, surely the grain of truth isn't just the time when Alysanne flew there, couldn't get her dragon past the Wall, and dealt with some captured wildlings.

 

Quote

The Rogue Prince

On the third day of third moon of 129 AC, Princess Helaena brought her three children to visit with the king in his chambers. The twins Jaehaerys and Jaehaera were six years old, their brother Maelor only two. His Grace gave the babe a pearl ring off his finger to play with, and told the twins the story of how their great-great-grandsire and namesake Jaehaerys the Old King had flown his dragon north to the Wall to defeat a vast host of wildlings, giants, and wargs. The children listened attentively. Afterward the king sent them away, pleading weariness. Then Viserys of House Targaryen, the First of His Name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm, closed his eyes and went to sleep.
 
Yea there are a lot of pieces GRRM laid out prior to F&B that i had based theories on just to have them smashed and changed hahaha According to @Ran, who asked George about this. Its just a "fanciful tale". 
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